The Gospel of Us: A story for Easter

Last year writer Owen Sheers teamed up with the National Theatre Wales to create a Passion play on the beach at Port Talbot. He's now turned it into a novel. In this extract, set on Good Friday, a mysterious stranger turns up by the seaside...

I realise I'm not someone you'd normally listen to; that usually you'd rather cross the street than risk hearing what I had to say – but you need to hear this.

Imagine me. My eyes hidden in the shadow of a hoodie, trackie bottoms, daps. The kid you recognise but never know; the kid with a dog slouch of a walk, a marble hardness in his eye. The kid who's half kid, half man. Who's stuck.

Don't expect me to be speaking like this, do you? Well, I never used to. But he changed all that. And that's why you need to hear this. Because this happened, and it happened here, to us. Believe me. Whenever my bampa was down the social telling a story, he'd pause before the best bits, lick his finger, touch it to his throat and then – so's you could only just hear him – whisper, 'God'shonesttruth now'. Then he'd carry on, making all those other men lean in over their pints and cans, listening.

If it begins anywhere, then it's with the man we came to call the Stranger. Still no one really knows who he was, or where he came from. But he came from somewhere and when he did, he came here, to the far end of the beach where the wind skates in across the bay to drive the dune grass crazy. That's where I first saw him. I used to go down that part of the beach on and off. End of the day, or start of it, letting that wind and the sea-light bring me round from whatever high I'd ridden or drink I'd sunk myself in the night before. He never talked to me, didn't even look at me. Just sat in this shelter he'd built, like a regular Crusoe, playing his guitar and singing to himself. At first I stayed well back, sitting on one of the dunes behind him, or on the wall in front of the Naval. But after I'd seen him a few times, I began to move closer, and that's when I heard what he was saying. And I wasn't the only one either. Every time I went down there, there were more of us, all moving slowly closer to him each time. No one speaking. Everyone just listening. Not that he was speaking or singing to us. No. It was the sea he was talking to, or just above it anyway, where the sky looks like water, or the water like sky.

When the slate falls, when the crowned head drops, when the sail is hoisted, the earth shall give them up. From the fire beneath the cross the treasure shall be released and the dead shall live and the living shall be heard and the heard shall be freed and the freer shall be dead. What was hidden shall be shown. What was silencedshall be said.What was forgotten shall be known.

That's how it went for a week. More people each day at dawn and dusk, under sun, rain and moon, and the Stranger singing his song to the sea. That's how it went. Until the morning of the Arrival, when everything changed.

The town was getting ready to welcome the Company Man. ICU was sending him here to make an announcement, and the Council and the Mayor had been getting themselves in a right twist about it for months. They wanted to show him a proper welcome, show him they had things handled down here, under control. That there was no need to go back to the bad old days when things had all got so bloody heavy-handed.

The preparations had been building for a week by then – platforms, welcome banners, bands practising flourishes and anthems. As the sun came up and I took my regular place in the dunes at the Stranger's camp, I could still hear the carpenters' hammers echoing up the beach. I'd been up all night, dropped a few tabs and I wanted to take some time out, hear him sing again, before I went home and tried to sleep. But as I sat down I saw something was different. The Stranger's song had changed, and he wasn't singing to the sea anymore but towards the Swansea end of the beach, towards the dunes and the grasses there.

He is come, the empty vessel that will fill, the one voice made of many the man-key who will turn the one who will release them and heal us with his hearing who will make us remember what we'll never forget. He is come.

All of us there, the crowd around his camp, we all looked to where the Stranger looked. Looked at the empty beach, his voice and the fizz of the waves filling our ears. There were more of us than usual; new faces had joined the regulars. Some had come because they'd been told about the Stranger; others were just passing. An early surfer, his wetsuit half peeled and his board under his arm; a woman walking her dog; a jogger, damp sand sprayed up the backs of his legs. All of us, motionless, looking down the empty beach.

Then, suddenly, the beach wasn't empty any more. There was a man. A man standing on a dune looking back at us; beard to his throat, wild hair stuck with bracken, clothes ragged and smeared.

When the Stranger saw him he stood up. The man was staring at him, couldn't take his eyes off him, like he was trying to remember where he'd seen him before. The Stranger though, he was as cool as you like, like this was all arranged. Like this was what he'd been waiting for.

For a minute or so they just carried on looking at each other. Then, moving awkwardly, like a man much older than he was, the Newcomer began walking down the dunes. When he got to him, the Stranger took him by the hand and led him down to the water's edge. Once there, the Stranger began undressing him, just started unpeeling the Newcomer right there and then on the beach. His skin was as white as a strip light. Dirty hands like gloves, a dove's collar of grime round his neck. Then the Stranger undressed too, leaving his clothes in a pile on the sand. And then they walked in, walked right on into the sea.

So, there they are, these two men, staring into each other's eyes, the foam of the waves washing round their waists, and all of us watching them. Eventually the Stranger breaks his stare and starts washing the Newcomer, scooping up handfuls of seawater over his arms and shoulders. All of us, meanwhile, begin walking down towards them. Which is when I see the two women and the little girl.

They were still far down the beach when I saw them, not as far as the preparations for the Company Man, but far enough so it was just their white nightdresses that shone out. I couldn't see their faces, but I could tell their ages from the way they moved. An old woman on the left, a little girl, no more than nine or ten in the middle, then a younger woman on the right. They were walking towards us, holding hands. And they weren't the only ones either, be- cause coming off the road was a chain of old men and women, shuffling down the road and up onto the beach. From the Home they were,YsbrydY Mor, in dressing gowns, slippers, nightdresses and pyjamas. Some of them couldn't have set foot outside for years, but there they were in the dawn light, the three cranes of the harbour standing to attention behind them, the whole town stirring from under the shadow of the mountain and these old folks, up and about and coming down to the sea to join in the fun.

National Theatre Wales in The Passion at Port Talbot PR

By the time they reached us the crowd had formed a big semi-circle at the water's edge, everyone watching the Stranger and the Newcomer. The old folks joined us, then so did the two women and the little girl, coming right into the middle of the semi-circle, silent as you like, to stand and watch what would happen next. Which was this. Slowly, the Stranger took the back of the Newcomer's head in the palm of his hand, like a mother might a baby's. With his other he embraced him, supporting him at his back like a movie star prepar ing to dip his lady for a kiss. Sundogs lit up the sea in patches behind them; the wind blew spray up into the early air and the gulls circled above, calling. For a second, everything was still, the two of them never taking their eyes off each other's face. Then, suddenly, it wasn't. Using all his strength, as if he wanted to get rid of him forever, the Stranger pushed the Newcomer, eyes still open, under the water.

He was under for a moment, and for a life. When he surfaced again the breath he took was like his first and when he lifted his head and looked at us, it was like he'd never seen people before.

The Stranger led him back onto the beach after that, where he dressed him not in the crazy mix of clothes he'd arrived in, but clothes given to him from the crowd. The surfer handed him his jeans; a young lad his blue hoodie; the woman with her dog, her socks. And the Stranger dressed him in them. Dressed him as tenderly as a lover, or a son dressing his father.

Then the dance began. I don't know who started it, where the first hip swayed or the first foot tapped, but out of nowhere, people were dancing. The old folks from the home, men, women, the surfer, the jogger, all of them started dancing around the Stranger and the Newcomer, dancing in a closing circle that swept them up and took them on down the beach. Everyone, dancing at dawn. Everyone, that is, except the two women and the little girl. They didn't dance. They just looked, standing in a line in their white nightdresses, hands held, watching. And I didn't dance either. My head was spinning, my body was light and my heart was pounding. I didn't understand anything and yet it had all made sense, as if it was all meant to happen. Like the coming of the tide or the setting of the sun. It was natural. But it was also too much for me, so I hung back while the old folks and the Stranger and the New- comer danced their way on down the beach, andthe two women and the little girl watched, and the town beyond started to wake, unaware of the storm approaching it.

The next time I saw the Stranger and the New- comer it wasn't in person, but on paper. Along with most of the town I'd gone to the welcoming preparations for the Company Man down at the other end of the beach. There isn't much love for ICU here, nearly every lad with a pocket full of plectrums has written some kind of a song having a go at them. But they were in charge back then so there was a three-line whip from the Council to turn up. And to be honest, sod all else normally happens, so of course we were all going to have a look-see, weren't we? Besides, the closest people like the Company Man usually ever get to us is when they drive over the Passover, when a few wisps of smoke from our fires might brush against their tyres or whiff in through the fans on their dashboards. So, yes, if he'd come to talk, then we were going to listen.

Anyway, so there I was, milling around the crowd, looking for a loose pocket to pick, when I saw the Stranger and the Newcomer again. At first I didn't know it was them. There was just this worried- looking woman, all frowns and concern, bloodshot eyes from crying, suddenly there in front of me shoving a piece of paper into my hand. 'Have you seen him? My son?' she was saying. 'Have you seen him?' Not that she stayed for an answer. Didn't pause even – went straight on to the next person, pushing another piece of paper on them, and then the next, and the next. There were two lads with her, trailing behind and looking equally concerned, but more for her than for the son she was asking about.

I looked down at the paper. MISSING, it said in big letters at the top, FOR FORTY DAYS AND FORTY NIGHTS. Then there was a photo, blurred and grainy, from CCTV from the looks of it – two men walking through the shopping centre, deep in conversation. One of them with his head circled and brighter than the other. Underneath the photograph it said: Last seen with this man in Aberafan Shopping Centre. Local teacher, missing for over a month. If you have any information please contact his family on 07927 935215.

I looked at the photograph again. And that's when I saw it was them. The Stranger and the Newcomer. The Stranger didn't look too different. Had the same beard and everything. But the Newcomer, this teacher, well, he looked like a stranger to himself. Clean shaven, hair slicked back, smart jacket and shoes. But it was him; I was sure of it. Something in the eyes, in the way he was looking at the Stranger. It was him.